Resurrection Mall available now from Down & Out Books.
Look for the newest Nick Forte novel, Bad Samaritan, in January, also from Down & Out Books.

One Bite at a Time

Monday, April 28, 2014

Black Rock, by John Fetridge

John McFetridge has lingered in the gray area of writers for
years. Critically acclaimed, a “writer’s writer” of whose work his peers could
not get enough. Readers have been slower to the party. Sales of his Toronto
series have not kept pace with the praise, leaving McFetridge dangerously close
to becoming a cult writer. (As defined by the late Donald Westlake, a cult
writer is an author seven readers shy of making a living.)

Sometimes it’s
necessary to take a step back in order to take two steps forward. In
McFetridge’s case, that step back is forty years, to the era of the Québécois
separatist movement of the 1970s. Public places were bombed, public figures
were kidnapped—and sometimes killed—and airplanes were hijacked. Montreal’s
police force is stretch beyond effectiveness, so when young women start showing
up dead there’s little or no response available.

Constable Eddie Dougherty is an Anglophone cop in a city
where both are suspect. He knew one of the dead girls and comes in contact with
the detective to whom the cases belong, at least when neither of them are
running down false leads or putting on shows of police presence for political
reasons, which is most of the time. Dougherty sees through the facades and
wants to work the real case; stealing time from his assignments as he can to
work with the more experienced homicide detective, who is himself torn between
wanting to catch the killer and keeping Dougherty out of trouble.

History makes troubled times and their resolution seem
inevitable. From the American civil rights movement and Vietnam through the
Irish Troubles and South African apartheid;
all seem relatively tidy and their results foreordained to those who have only
read of them. McFetridge strips historical hindsight away from the reader,
placing him on the ground with Dougherty, not understanding what’s happening,
unable to guess what comes next, more uncertain than afraid, which may be even
worse. The writing style is perfect for putting the reader in the streets with
the characters. Their sense of confusion and wonder is made clear, as no
overarching view is provided; the reader knows what the characters know,
filtered through their eyes.

For fans of McFetridge’s previous books, Black Rock has the voice and
ear-catching dialog that make all of them such engrossing reads. Now add a
sense of history, a You Are There
sense of being involved in things larger than oneself, and you’ll have a good
idea of what his newest venture is like to read. Kirkus has said Black Rock may be McFetridge’s breakout
book; the same could have been said about more than one previous effort,
notably 2008’s Everybody Knows This is
Nowhere. Maybe the historical connection will lend a previously unnoticed gravitas to Black Rock that will propel McFetridge to the top ranks. For years
he has written books that are not only set in Canada, but are about Canada. It would be no more than
fair for the book that places him most squarely into Canadian history to be the
one that makes him more than a regional success.

Lots of ways to order Res Mall

Worst Enemies, Book 1 of the Penns River series

Click the cover to buy

Grind Joint, Book 2 of the Penns River series

Click the cover to buy

Forte 4: A Dangerous Lesson Available Now! Click the image below to purchase.

Chicago Private Investigator Nick Forte’s official task is to find out what he can about Jennifer Vandenbusch’s new suitor, who fails to measure up in the eyes of the family matriarch, Jennifer’s grandmother. This seems par for the course for Forte, as his personal life has been leading him through a series of men who treat women badly, though none nearly as badly as the Thursday Night Slasher. Forte lives on the fringes of the investigation run by his old friend Sonny Ng until elements of Forte’s case and life dovetail with the Slasher investigation, leading to Forte discovering more about the crimes—and himself—than he wanted to know.

The Man in the Window

"...we see him getting rougher, tougher and darker book by book. There are multiple twists in the end, two cool sidekicks, good action scenes and some pretty nifty Chanderlisms in this book, adding up to a perfect PI read"--Sons of Spade blog

The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of (Nick Forte 2)

It's a kind of authorial magic that The Stuff That Dreams Are Made Of works as a tribute and as a story, and that neither aspect interferes in the least with the other… I can imagine this book finding its way into a class on writing crime fiction as an example of how to pay tribute to one's predecessors while at the same time writing a story that can stand on its own. It's an impressive accomplishment.--- Peter Rozovsky, Detectives Beyond Borders, December 18, 2014

About Me

Two of my Nick Forte Private investigator novels (A SMALL SACRIFICE and THE MAN IN THE WINDOW) received nominations for Shamus Awards. I also write a series of police procedurals set in the economically depressed town of Penns River PA, published by Down & Out Books. A non-fiction essay, “Chandler’s Heroes,” appeared in Spinetingler Magazine online in October of 2013.
I live in Laurel MD with The Beloved Spouse.